Astronomy: Nicolaus Copernicus

Mikolaj Kopernik also know as Copernicus was a Polish astromer, born in 1473. He attended the University of Cracow in 1491, where he studied classical literature, law and theology. From 1496 until 1503 he studied in Italy and reached doctorates in law and medicine. He was interested in the Greek learning of the Renaissance and got familiar with Greek astronomy. In that time many Christians believed in the ideas of Plato of perfect mental geometry. And sustained these ideas in believing in the perfection and universality of God. When Copernicus compared the movements of the planets with their computed places, the theory was far from perfect. A puzzling problem occupied him when he returned to Poland in 1503. Why did it seem that the planetary periods seemed to be related to the solar period, or terrestrial year; in stead of the idea of a geocentric Universe. Why if everything rotated around the Earth did Mars, Jupiter and Saturn sometimes display retrogade motions; the Moon, Mercury and Venus did not display this motion. In 1514 he composed the unpublished work Commentariolus and in 1539 he allowed Georg Joachim Rheticus from Germany to read the notes. The German Andreas Osiander published the book De Revolutionibus Orbium Ceolestium, which Copernicus had written later containing the heliocentric theory. Nicolaus Copernicus died of a stroke on 24 May 1543. It is said that he received a copy of the published masterpiece just before his death. In this masterpiece the now correct heliocentric theory was published, but still not accepted. First Tycho Brahe launched his Tychonic Universe, which was accepted and commonly believed after the unchanging and perfect heavens from Aristotle. Related subject >> Tycho Brahe

Nicholaus Copernicus